Background Briefing (Not a Boring Post ... No, Really!)

Nassau troops at Hougoumont during the Battle of Waterloo
Jan Hoynck van Papendrecht 

While I was doing research for the next chapter in my novel of the Waterloo campaign, it struck me that many of you might not know the broad outline of that campaign. Ya know, what the ossifers like to call "the big picture."

So today, I am going to remedy that.

If you've been following along, you know that in March of 1815, Napoléon Bonaparte escaped with a small band of followers from the island of Elba. He had been installed as the ruler of that place by the victorious European powers after his first abdication. The use of the word "first" might give you a clue as to what happened next.

That small band of followers advanced on Paris, growing into an army as they did do. It is rumored that Napoléon sent a letter to Louis XVIII, King of France, telling him not to bother sending him any more troops as he had more that enough for the moment. You see the King was sending troops of the Royal Army to stop Napoléon. Thing is though, most, if not all, of those men had formerly been in the Imperial Army of Napoléon himself.

Things sucked in France in 1815, the nobles who had fled the revolution had returned and many wished to set the clock back to 1789. Land had been taken from them (and the Church mind you) and given to the people to have as their own. Many of those nobles (and yes, the Church too) wanted that stuff back.

Unemployment was rife, after all France had been on a war economy for over 20 years and there was no need for the manufacture of weapons, cannon, uniforms, and all the other various and sundry things needed by an army arrayed against the whole of Europe. (Well, most of it anyway.)

Businesses had been shut down and with the army shedding thousands of troops, there were no jobs for those former soldiers. So the return of Napoléon seemed a good alternative to the King and all those nobles.

I reckon that most people, but not all, had forgotten of the hardships of campaigns, the thousands of deaths, and the general turmoil which had engulfed most of Europe for 25 years. 'Tis only natural, people tend to remember the good times, not the bad times. (You know they had their share ...¹)

At any rate, Louis fled Paris with his supporters (having no desire to see if the Parisian mob would treat him as they had treated his brother, Louis XVI, who had "sneezed into the basket²" in 1793) and Napoléon Bonaparte was once again hailed as Emperor. That would last for roughly a hundred days (hence the label Les Cent Jours attached to all of my posts in the series).

We've covered the very early stages of the campaign when Napoléon's Armée du Nord, crossed over into the United Netherlands on the 15th of June, 1815. That day was mostly skirmishing and maneuvering, the 16th would see two battles being fought, we're in the midst of those two battles now: Ligny and Quatre Bras.

Map of the area where the battles were fought.
(Source)

These two battles were where the campaign was lost, Waterloo itself was simply the final act. Not that Napoléon would have lost anyway, but by the time the sun rose on the 18th, the French had only a slim chance of victory.

But they still had a chance.

(Source [modified])

In the map above, we can see that the blue circle, marked with an "N," is the position Napoléon hoped to achieve in the initial battles. That is, between the armies of Wellington and Blücher. Napoléon's army outnumbered Wellington's army, it also outnumbered Blücher's, as you can see below:

Napoléon: 124,000–126,000

Wellington: 107,000

Blücher: 123,000

Total: 230 000

Together they had a significant numerical superiority over Napoléon. The Emperor couldn't afford to let the two combine. On the 16th he accomplished that, but that separation wouldn't last.

The red arrow marked "1" is the path of retreat Napoléon wanted the Prussians to take, he dispatched Marshal Grouchy and perhaps a third of his army to push Blücher in that direction. The arrow marked "2" is the path actually taken by most of Blücher's army.

While French scouts did report large numbers of troops retreating along arrow "1," those in fact were stragglers and deserters, not as numerous as reported. In the meantime, old Blücher (he was 73, not old by today's standard - said the 70-year old - but old in those days) took the bulk of his army north, towards the town of Wavre.

The orange arrow marked "3" is the retreat path Wellington chose, towards Brussels. Though he didn't lose at Quatre Bras, the Prussian retreat from Ligny forced the Duke to fall back.

In essence, Napoléon had achieved his initial objective, split his enemies. He had, however, deceived himself as to the scope of the Prussian defeat (for such it was, Napoléon's last victory) and assumed that the Prussians were finished for this campaign.

He was sadly mistaken.

(Source)

The map above shows the general movement of the three armies from the 15th to the 18th of June. I hope you will use this as a guide while reading the rest of the posts in this series.

Something is definitely squirrelly with Blogger (the host of this blog). As of 1900 EDT on Wednesday, that day's post had garnered less than a hundred views (oh my faithful readers!) Yet the number of views for the blog itself was at 6,403. Hhmm, what's up with that?

I don't care, I ain't in it for the page views, nope. As long as I enjoy writing, and two or three of you keep reading, I'll keep at this blogging thing of ours.

Adieu my Chanters, see you tomorrow.

¹ Musical reference, what band, what song?

² A euphemism for being executed by guillotine.